


A Circle of Salt

by ANebulaDarkly



Category: Hocus Pocus (1993)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-09
Updated: 2015-10-09
Packaged: 2018-04-25 12:46:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4961209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ANebulaDarkly/pseuds/ANebulaDarkly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of small snippets of what happened after the night a virgin lit a candle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Circle of Salt

 

Thackery Binx’s parents never found his body, but they did craft a head stone for him. Three hundred years later, three children stand at his grave on the morning of November first and bury a cat.

* * *

 Mr. and Mrs. Dennison are forced to accept that some things in life are unexplainable. This includes the fact that their children continue to fight on occasion after the move, but are always quick to resolve the matter on their own. Other issues include the little problem of the hole in their roof that seems to be caused by something inside exploding out and not an alleged tree branch falling in.

Despite Max’s anger over the move, it is he who jumps in when they mention repairing the roof and suggests they should remodel a few smaller things “as a family project”. Dani quickly suggests that it should be a theme fitting to their new town and include everything that keeps away witches “like they taught us in school”. The Dennisons shrug and figure if their children are willing to do house work, why stop it?

Allison becomes a common figure as the ‘remodeling’ takes place, a remodeling that take even longer than the roof repairs. The older girl gives lessons on witch lore as Max bears the brunt of the work, Dani flitting around them, helping where she can. The Dennisons drink their coffee, read their papers, and watch from a distance as the younger three spend the better part of that weekend in the yard.

Max balances atop a ladder outside the back door while Dani hands him the iron horseshoe Allison found for them two weeks ago. The shoe is followed by a hammer and seven nails. They repeat the process above the front door as well. Allison surveys the work and explains that it takes seven nails because seven is the luckiest number.

Later, Max digs a hole in the back yard. After he backs away for a drink of water, Dani tosses in fertilizer. Allison sites William Hone’s _The Table Book_ as she and Max lift the young, dormant tree upright. Dani circles them on her hands and knees, filling in the soil around the roots of their precious new Rowan. The tree makes it through the winter and first harsh storm of the New Year. Every twig that falls is tied or nailed to every available surface of their home.

The following spring, the siblings tear up the earth around the edge of the property and plant nothing but hazel. Potted hazel takes residence along every paved edge. Allison visits to inspect their progress and to bring them lunch in a basket.

When scorching weather finally arrives to New England, Max stands before a large bucket in the center of the driveway and stirs white paint. Dani hovers beside him, pouring in salt. When the salt runs out, Allison arrives with two more bags full straight from the grocery. It takes the trio all that week in June to repaint the whole house.

Every so often during the remodel, the Dennisons ask their children the specifics of what they are doing and why. The answers are always straight to the point. “Salt is the only thing that can protect a witch’s victim from her power!” As they lay in bed on midsummer’s night, the parents discuss the previous Halloween when their children appear at town hall raving about resurrected witches. Suddenly, a lot of the updates make sense. They are all in order to protect the house. Mystery solved, Mr. and Mrs. Dennison roll over and sleep. Max and Dani’s fervor seems a bit over the top, sure, but witches don’t really exist, do they?

* * *

 Dani never forgets the deal Max made with her that Halloween in the entrance of Allison’s house. Max still owes her. Big time. She had not wanted to go to the museum in the first place and had been the first to state it was time to go. Her stupid brother had lit the candle anyway.

During the course of that night she had been forced to flee for her life, tied to a chair, and stuffed into a dead man’s grave. The bruising from the ropes had lasted for two weeks, and the nightmares had lingered for months. She still shakes at the sight of lighting.

Though that night had been the scariest night of her life, it had not exactly been the worst. She _did_ adopt a talking cat, met a good zombie, and even rode on a flying broomstick. She doubts any other eight year old could say the same. In these small ways, she is happy that Max lit that candle even though every dawn she watches after that night makes her heart ache. Despite having known magic for one night of her life because of his mistake, Dani does not let Max forget his original deal.

Her hair in curls, Dani dons a blue night gown and black slippers. She flutters ahead of Max and Allison. Max tilts his feathered hat over his face as best he can and self-consciously pulls his tunic down over his tights. Allison attempts to stifle a giggle.

* * *

 When Max looks for Dani, more often than not he finds her in the cemetery, sitting within a circle of salt before Binx’s grave. Her hand always rests on her left cheek. Sometimes she stands oblivious to the world and blindly follows Max home. Sometimes she is already asleep by the time he arrives. He carries her home until she becomes too big to carry. When she turns fifteen, he carries a blanket and thermos of hot chocolate with him. Together they sit, sometimes in silence, sometimes in whispers of memories that still keep them awake at night.

* * *

 The older Emily grows, the more often she wonders why her aunt never marries. She thinks that her aunt must get lonely in a house so large, so Emily spends her free time visiting. Aunt Dani commands a herd of black cats that keep her just as entertained as cousins might, never scolds when Emily knocks over the salt shaker, and doesn’t avoid the question when Emily asks what a virgin is.

When her parents strictly forbid her from ever lighting candles and go so far as to never keep a candle in the house, Dani is the one who explains to her what Max had done in their younger years, reveals to her that her favorite bed time story is not just a story, and gives Emily a candle of her own to keep.

The trend holds. Emily continues to ask her aunt questions others avoid and to confess all her biggest secrets to Dani. Her aunt knows before anyone else which girls are mean to her at school, which girls she hopes will become her friends, and the boy she likes. She solemnly promises Dani to break off any relationship should he suggest the Sanderson Sisters Museum as a date and agrees that he should take her to the movies like a normal person.

* * *

 Dani begins to worry that the bond forged between aunt and niece two decades ago has dulled with the physical distance between the two over the past few months. Tonight, however, all the Dennisons, save one, are gathered at Max and Allison’s house for a winter celebration. Though the older Mr. and Mrs. Dennison leave shortly after dinner, the Dennison Family Christmas Party does not end until Max and Allison fall asleep wrapped in knitted blankets on the couch, an empty bottle of wine resting beside their makeshift nest. When Emily begins to yawn, Dani cleans up their card game and prepares to leave. Dani puts on her coat in the foyer and kisses her niece, now as tall as she is, on the cheek. Emily thanks her aunt again for her scarf in school colors and locks the door behind Dani.

Strolling down the pathway, Dani swells with pride at the knowledge of her niece's academic endeavors, but hopes Emily has found some happiness beyond her books at her west coast college. Dani’s breath hangs white in the darkness as she stops at the street to glance back at the house. A single lit candle flickers on the window sill of her niece’s room. Dani turns, flings her knitted scarf over her shoulder, and cackles the whole walk home.

* * *

 “It’s been some time, Dani,” a male voice calls.

Her hands still as she looks from her knitting and over the wire rim of her glasses. She’s always known this day would come, and she’s secretly pleased to see her wayward cat at last.

“I wanted so much more for you,” he whispers.

“I’ve had all I ever wanted.”

“Didn’t you want to marry?”

“No one else seemed worth the time.”

“Eighty years is a long time, Dani.”

“So is three hundred.”

* * *

 Emily steps onto the porch that is somehow always smaller than she remembers and finds her Aunt Dani resting in her rocking chair looking toward the East. Blue yarn dangles from still hands. Following her aunt’s glassy gaze, Emily grabs the porch rail for support, in the process knocking over the ever present shaker of salt. Blind to the white grains spiraling around her feet, Emily swears she sees two figures. One is a younger girl with long, messy hair and the other, a rakish young man wearing breeches and an open white shirt. He lacks shoes. The two walk hand in hand into the burgeoning dawn. 

 

The End

 

 

 

 

 

_A little bonus…_

Tara, Molly, and Bethany become best friends at age three. It is only logical that their Halloween costumes match every year. After all the costumes over many years, they hold in their hearts the night they dress as the Sanderson Sisters as the best Halloween night of all their lives even though their parents do not believe their tale when said adults wander home at dawn, even though the proof of bruises from their landing wan, and even when the magic of the brooms does not return the next night or the next Halloween. Despite all this, the memory of soaring through cold, night wind does not diminish, but remains as crisp as starlight. Even when their hair is gray, grandchildren tumble underfoot, and the hands that grasp their beloved brooms are weathered, the trio still sweeps with wistful looks and sighs.


End file.
